Background Players: The Position of Grace
Even if you’re not a scientist, you’ve seen DNA. The double-helix shape of that molecule is as familiar as a brand logo. You don’t have to know the first thing about genetics to recognize that twisted ladder—it shows up in textbooks, documentaries, even in pop culture.
The two men who are usually credited with discovering the shape of DNA are James Watson and Francis Crick. In 1953, they published a paper in Nature that unveiled the now-famous double helix model. For decades, the spotlight stayed fixed on them.
But what many people don’t realize is that Watson and Crick’s breakthrough leaned heavily on the work of a woman named Rosalind Franklin. She was an X-ray crystallographer—and if you’re like me, you don’t have the faintest idea what that means.
A crystallographer is a scientist who takes pictures of things too small for ordinary cameras. Instead of using visible light, they use X-rays, which can pass through the atomic structure of a molecule. By studying those patterns, they can figure out the structure of the molecule.
Franklin took a series of X-ray photographs of DNA. One of those images became famously known as Photo 51. It showed a sharp, unmistakable X-shaped pattern. That image revealed DNA’s double helix shape. Watson and Crick used it to build their model.
For a long time, Franklin’s role in the story was overlooked. But later histories brought her contribution into focus. She was in the background of a significant discovery, yet her work shaped the foreground.
Positioned for Grace
And you might wonder why I’m writing about Rosalind Franklin. It’s because she is an example of someone who mattered more than she first appeared. Sometimes history spotlights the loudest voices or the names on the marquee. But often the real breakthroughs come from those in the background.
I’m currently in a teaching series at the church I pastor that focuses on people in the Bible who were important, yet little noticed—sometimes not even named. I keep being reminded that you don’t have to be in the spotlight to be used by God. People like the servant girl of Naaman’s mistress, or Ehud, or Huldah—this week’s subject—were all background figures, yet God used them in mighty ways.
Being in the background is a humble role. But God is drawn to the humble. James 4:6 teaches us, “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” This means that humility positions us to receive grace. And that’s a position often more influential than the one the frontliners hold.
So if you feel like you’re in the background, be encouraged. Background players who walk in humility walk in compounded levels of grace. And that’s no small thing.
